general stuff

An evening walk

Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)33 Comments

 

River

 

Amy2

 

Farm

 

Field - Copy

 

River ash

 

Laying cows

 

Cowdrink

 

Am

 

Cows

 

Cows2

 

Cows4

 

Cows6

 

Roman snail helix pomatia

 

Flowers

 

Wheat3

 

Widbury hill

 

Sky

 

Evening

 

Since finishing her GCSEs 3 weeks ago Amy has been at a bit of a loose end and it's been nice to spend a little more time with her. On Thursday evening we went for a long walk together, exploring some of our local countryside around Great Amwell nature reserve and walking the Amwell walkway which follows the course of a dismantled railway branch line. It was a lovely evening and we saw and heard lots of wildlife including rabbits, butterflies, dragonflies, some huge Roman snails (Helix pomatia which was exciting as they are quite rare and endangered here in the UK), a green woodpecker and lots of water birds. I was really hoping to see a barn owl but we weren't that lucky.

Along the path that runs through farmland we had an uncomfortably close encounter with a herd of cows, young bullocks I think they were. When we first walked through their field they were laying down but on the way back they were drinking and grazing, stopping when we walked past and becoming very curious about us. Disconcertingly they followed us all the way down the field, getting closer all the while and we were relieved to reach the stile and climb over, leaving them on the other side.

Before returning to the canal we climbed Widbury Hill and enjoyed the views across Ware and the Lea Valley. On the way back down, with the rich evening sunlight warming our backs we could hear bells pealing out across the fields as the ringers practiced at the church and it felt like a perfect moment in time.

It's not easy to remain connected to your child as they navigate their teenage years. Often I feel that my words and advice are not welcome and mostly actively ignored. Spending time with me is often pretty low on her list of priorities, so sharing moments like these with her is a precious thing and I treasure them all the more because of their comparative rarity. It fills my heart with pleasure that despite her usual preference for spending time immersed in the technology of computers and digital communication she can still enjoy and access the simple and rewarding pleasure of being quiet, observant and appreciative in a beautiful place.

 

crafts & knitting · magazine features

knitting constancy

Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)47 Comments

Throughout all the ups and downs that life can bring, knitting is always there as a comforting part of my days. Though I might have temporarily misplaced my blog voice I can always find something knitted to share with you, so I thought I'd pop in and show you what has been occupying my needles lately.

 

Bunnypair

 

As always there have been bunnies. This pair are mostly knitted from a discontinued ball of Rowan Scottish Tweed in 'porridge' that I had stashed. I love the little brown neps peppered throughout and am feeling rather sad that this is now all used up. Here I paired it with a strand of cream Rowan Kidsilk Haze for fuzziness and used a brown alpaca yarn for contrast.

Yarns do come and go and it's always a bit disappointing when a favourite is discontinued. My favourite yarn for knitting animal clothing has always been Rowan 4ply cotton (which was discontinued years ago) and although I still have a fair amount of it stashed I have been hunting around for a good replacement ever since. Happily I've now found it in BC Garn's Alba. This is a soft, matt, organic cotton yarn (not mercerised) and comes in a beautiful range of colours, some and bright and jewel-like and some muted, subtle tones (which are the ones I like the best). The knitted fabric drapes beautifully and I'm having fun playing with ideas for new dresses in this lovely palette of colours (the blue swatch below is a discontinued Rowan 4ply).

 

Bcgarn

 

I bought the colours above from Loop and Love knitting stock some of the colour range.

 

Clothes

 

There's also been excitement recently at the arrival of the morning post which in the last two weeks has brought me two wonderful magazines kindly mentioning my work. The first was the June edition of Australian Homespun which had a lovely write up about the cat patterns and the sweaters.

 

Magazine articles

 

The second is the current Issue 148 of Simply Knitting which has an interesting article on blogging, featuring interviews with 4 knitting bloggers (of which I was one). It's always a lovely feeling (and a little surreal) to see yourself in print and I'm hugely flattered to have been included in both of these publications.

Well, I'm off to make some breakfast and rouse the rest of the family, who are all still snoozing. See you soon and until then best wishes for a very happy 4th July to all my friends in the USA x

 

crafts & knitting · garden stuff · wildlife

June days

Julie (little Cotton Rabbits)52 Comments

Wetgarden

 

Garden

 

Chive

 

Seedling

 

Cake (3)

 

Pyra

 

There's been a fair bit of wet and stormy weather around lately but that's been good news for the garden where everything now has that early summer vibrancy and is growing vigorously. In some cases a little to vigorously as my little veg patch is getting swamped by the herb edging. This year I'm growing beetroot, broccoli, kale, french beans, peas, courgettes and lettuce and I'm looking forward to a green feast in another month or so.

Happily we've had a taste of summer too with a few days that have been warm and sunny enough to sit outside. There's something so very calming and relaxing about an afternoon outside with something nice to eat and drink, a little knitting and a good book (Knitlandia by Clara Parkes is a great read if you are a knitter, though my copy has already lost it's pretty dust-jacket to Toby's paper tearing obsession). Hopefully there are more sun-filled summer days to come.

My knitting has been very influenced by the colours of a summer garden too. I was so thrilled when I managed to buy this wonderful skein from Maya at The Wool Barn. Her yarns are exquisitely hand dyed so it's not surprising that they sell out so very quickly. This colour-way is called Rose Garden and I'm knitting a crescent shawl from it, Helen Stewart's Spindrift Shawl. I'm almost finished now and just need to choose between pink and green for the edge, as I fancy a contrasting border.

There have been some happy days working on this in the summer sunshine and it's been lovely to escape some of the stresses of exam time (Amy's GCSE's have spanned most of the last month) with a little gentle and undemanding knitting. We're all looking forward to next Tuesday when Amy has her last exam. She will be so relieved and it will be nice to have a more relaxed atmosphere here. It's been a bit exhausting trying to keep Toby quiet in his middle-of-the-night-awake periods but essential in order to make sure that Amy has had the sleep she needs to do well in her exams.

 

Woolbarnyarn

 

Rosegarden

 

Garden knit

 

Rosegardenshawl

 

Sorry that I've not been around much recently, I've not felt like I've had much of interest to say or to share. Life has been full of ordinary family stuff with it's ups and downs and we live day to day, which is the best way to approach life with Toby, but so often the day seems to whizz by without much getting done. I do try to take photos when something interesting presents itself (like this wonderfully tender swan family encountered on a walk a few weeks back), but I seem to have lost my blog voice a little. Hopefully I'm just a little hoarse rather than completely voice-less and I'll be back soon with more words. 'Til then thanks for visiting x

 

Swans